Know How to Write a Powerful Resume Part 2

Competition for job applicants is fierce to say the least. It is more important than ever to be armed with the knowledge of how to write a powerful resume.

As professional resume and cover letter writer I had the opportunity to lead Resume writing workshops for many years. Along with facilitating the finding employment workshops I also personally I wrote or reviewed over 4,000 resumes for job seekers across the USA and Canada. My students and clients ranged from truck drivers to engineers, homemakers to pilots and ditch diggers to doctors. What did they all have in common? They all wanted a powerful resume.

Even though the occupations and backgrounds were so diverse the strategies for writing a powerful resume were basically the same. Include the information that is vital to the employer's needs and leave off anything that would lower your chance of being chosen.

As mentioned in an earlier article of the thousands of students who came through my workshops often were making some very common mistakes. These mistakes seriously prevented their resume having any real power and dramatically reducing its effectiveness. When I teach a workshop on how to write a powerful resume I like to start with a multiple choice quiz so that I can begin to lay the groundwork for changing how the jobseeker approaches writing a resume. As a facilitator is is important to start where the participant is already so that I can add to what he knows.

The last four questions on this quick ten question quiz are: Is it acceptable to stretch the truth or pad your resume? What is the best way to present your information on your resume? Should you include an interests area on your resume? and What should you always send along with your resume?

The main reason for starting a resume writing workshop with this quiz was to shed light on some very common resume writing mistakes. Once the participants were shown how these mistakes were killing the effectiveness of their resume, it was easy to get them to make changes.